By Matt Le CrenOnly 3.9 miles separate Naperville Central and Benet, yet it has been more than a decade since the two schools met in group play at the Naperville Invitational.

That changes at 10 a.m. Saturday when the Redhawks, ranked ninth in the Chicagoland Soccer top 25, host no. 22 Benet at Memorial Stadium in a match that likely will decide who wins Group A and advances to the April 28 quarterfinals.

“When we started this 19 years ago, Benet was in our group,” said Naperville Central and tournament co-founder Ed Watson. “When we brought in Barrington, we needed to move somebody.”

That team was Benet, which has played group matches first at Wheaton North and then Barrington in recent years. The Redwings haven’t made the quarterfinals during Bob Gros’ five years as head coach, always losing to state power New Trier.

Now Benet is back in the Naperville Central pool along with Oswego, while Palatine and Downers Grove South are in different groups.

“I wanted to get away from playing Palatine, simply because now we have two sectional opponents (in the group) before the sectional seeding meeting,” Watson noted. “So this allows me to make sure my teams could play two teams in the sectional.

“With Downers South no longer being in our sectional, it didn’t make any sense to not give them someone else to play.”

This will be the first meeting between Naperville Central and Benet since they played a meaningless consolation game at the Naperville Invitational two years ago.Though some of the players know each through club ball and Watson coached a few Benet players at the youth level in years past, the relative unfamiliarity will present an exciting challenge.

“It will be a good test to see how we play against teams that we don’t know as much about,” Naperville Central star striker Ryan Dudycha said. “Because when we hear about teams like Neuqua and Waubonsie, we can plan out what we want to do, but to come out with limited knowledge it will show a lot about us to see how we react and how we adapt to their play.”

What does Dudycha, who is tied with Meridith Hannan for the team scoring lead with six goals, think about the matchup?

“I haven’t heard much about Benet this year,” Dudycha said. “We did play some of their team in an indoor league this year, so nothing serious or anything. I’m excited to play them and excited to win, hopefully.”

Both squads have done a lot of winning this spring. The Redhawks (6-3-3), who play Oswego on Thursday, impressively blanked Waubonsie Valley and Neuqua Valley in back-to-back games last week before losing a 1-0 overtime decision Tuesday to Wheaton Warrenville South on a penalty kick with two seconds left.

Benet (6-1-1), which opens tournament play Friday against Oswego, has succeeded with a similar blueprint: great defense and just enough offense. The Redwings have given up just seven goals, two fewer than the Redhawks.

“We’re very capable of defending but we also are very capable of having the momentary breakdown,” Gros said. “We’re very proud of our defense this year, but they’re very young and prone to having moments.”

That’s why Gros takes Watson’s laments about the Redhawks’ lack of offense with a grain of salt.

“I do know Ed always talks about how his team can’t score,” Gros said. “Keep it, up, Ed. Convince your girls they can’t score, but I’m a little more concerned.

“We have to be cautious not to give up many set-pieces. They can give us some problems in that regard.”

Indeed, a significant share of Naperville Central’s goals come on restarts, including a pair of penalty kicks from Dudycha. That’s been a theme for nearly a decade.

But soccer has a way of turning conventional wisdom upside down.

“Most people assume this is going to be a 0-0 game or one goal wins it,” Gros said. “But you watch; it will end up being 3-2 or something like that.”

For that to happen, the Redwings will have to get more efficient. They love to attack out of their 4-3-3 formation and are capable of getting their outside backs forward, as they showed when sophomore defender Erin Flynn assisted freshman Nicole Burns on the game-winning goal in Monday’s 1-0 win over Wheaton Academy.

Junior Katie Gesior has been excellent, especially on free kicks, and leads the team with 10 goals. But two players expected to produce big numbers – senior defensive midfielder Ellie Bumpus and junior forward Betsy Keefe – have gotten off to slow starts. Keefe has two goals and Bumpus has yet to score.

“We’re waiting for some kids to break out,” Gros said. “We need to have that happen in this tournament if we’re going to be successful.”

Though Naperville Central and Oswego (7-2-2) present a formidable challenge, Gros is excited not to have to play reigning state champion New Trier this weekend.

“We played New Trier four or five years in a row,” Gros said. “We played them tough, but they were too much for us. And then we’d pick up another tough team like Sandburg. This (year) is a much easier path.”